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PAPER  BY  THE  HON.  L.  S.  COFFIN  OF  FT.  DODGE,  IOWA,  ON  SAFETY 
APPLIANCES  BEFORE  THE  WORLD’S  AUXILIARY  RAILWAY  CON¬ 
GRESS,  CHICAGO,  ILL.,  JUNE  1893. 

M  *  - 

Mr.  President,  Members  of  the  Congress: 

Doubtless  no  paper  read  before  this  most  eminent  Railway  Con- 
^  gress  will  have  to  deal  with  a  question  of  greater  vital  interest,  both 
to  the  great  travelling  public  and  to  the  now  vast  army  of  railway 
employes,  than  this  of  safety  appliances  as  connected  with  handling 
cars  and  running  trains.  Great  and  absolutely  beyond  the  grasp  of 
the  mind  to  properly  conceive  of  the  value  to  us  as  a  nation  as  are 
the  advantages  accruing  to  us  from  railway  transportation  of  what 
we  term  freight,  still  all  this  weighs  as  of  little  worth  when  life  is  in 
the  other  scale  of  the  balance.  This  trite  saying  expresses  it: 
“What  is  all  the  wTorld  to  a  man  when  his  wife  is  a  widow?”  What 
matters  it  if  I  can  take  my  cars  of  stock  to  a  great  central  market 
from  my  farm  500  miles  away  in  24  hours,  if  after  disposing  of  that 
stock  at  good  prices  on  my  homeward  journey  with  the  proceeds  in 
my  pocket  I  lose  my  life  in  a  wreck  caused  by  lack  of  proper  safety 
appliances  ? 

While  we  want  quick  transportation  for  our  stuff,  we  want  safe 
.  as  well  as  rapid  transit  for  ourselves  more.  But  where  in  the  history 
of  the  marvelous  development  of  railroad  facilities  shall  we  begin  the 
discussion  of  safety  appliances  ? 

A  careful  study  of  the  exhibits  in  yonder  Transportation  Build¬ 
ing  will  not  only  surprise  but  serve  to  correct  us  in  the  matter  of 
dates  as  to  the  original  idea  and  use  of  rails  for  roadways  for  heavy 
traffic.  We  are  so  accustomed  to  look  back  to  1830  when  the  Man¬ 
chester  &  Liverpool  railway  was  opened,  as  the  birth  of  railroads. 
While  it  may  be  true  about  that  date  commenced  the  application  of 
steam  for  propelling  carriages  upon  “tram”  or  railways,  we  must  go 
back  yet  200  years  further  at  least  to  find  the  first  railway  used  in 
England.  It  may  help  our  memories  some  to  associate  the  first 
recorded  use  of  rails  laid  from  the  collieries  at  New  Castle  to  the 
shipping  docks  with  the  landing  of  the  Pilgrim  Fathers  upon  the 
shores  of  this  new  world.  These  rails  were  made  of  plank,  six  feet 
A  long  and  four  inches  thick.  These  wooden  rails  were  in  course  of 
time  worn  and  rendered  unsafe,  and  to  remedy  this  plates  of  iron 
were  spiked  upon  them,  and  the  men  who  did  this  work  soon  became 
\  known  as  “plate  layers,”  a  name  to-day  used  in  some  parts  of  Eng- 
land  to  denote  the  men  who  lay  the  safer  30  feet  steel  rail,  35  to  90 
^pounds  to  the  yard.  Striking  contrast  truly  between  the  kind  of 
rails.  These  iron-plated  rails  of  course  caused  rapid  wear  to  the  old 


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wooden  wheels  of  the  carts,  and  for  safety  cast  iron  wheels  were  in¬ 
troduced  in  1765-70.  The  iron-plated  rails  gave  place  to  cast  rails 
three  feet  long  four  inches  wide,  with  a  flange  on  the  inner  side  to 
guide  the  wheels. 

In  1789  Engineer  Mr.  William  Jessop  in  building  a  railroad 
from  Loughborough  to  Leicestershire  made  a  wonderful  forward 
step  in  the  safety  line  by  abandoning  the  flanged  rail  and  bringing 
in  the  flanged  wheel.  Here  let  us  note  was  the  advent  of  one  of  the 
great  safety  appliances  upon  which  depends  the  safety  of  all  railroad 
travel  and  traffic  of  the  present  hour,  viz.:  “the  flanged  wheel.” 
Who  of  us  ever  think  when  rounding  a  sharp  curve  in  a  palace  car 
at  40  to  50  miles  an  hour  that  William  Jessop,  an  almost  forgotten 
engineer  and  mechanic  of  England  100  years  ago,  invented  and 
brought  out  the  very  idea  that  to-day  is  the  greatest  practical  safety 
appliance  that  holds  our  flying  trains  in  safety  to  the  rail  ? 

It  might  be  interesting  and  instructive  to  follow  up  step  by  step 
the  changes  and  progress  made  both  in  wheel  and  rail  as  well  as  in 
the  sub  structure;  but  over  there  in  the  White  City  this  can  all  be 
taken  in  by  object  lessons.  How  natural,  too,  it  was  to  think  that 
the  firmer  and  more  solid  the  foundation  upon  which  the  rails  were 
laid  the  safer  it  would  be,  and  at  what  immense  cost  were  stone  pil¬ 
lars  and  sleepers  put  down  on  which  to  lay  the  rails.  How  many 
thousands  of  dollars  it  has  cost  to  learn  that  “elasticity”  in  the  sub 
structure  is  an  essential  safety  appliance.  Hot  only  in  Old  England 
but  in  our  Hew  England  early  pioneers  in  railroad  building  had  to 
pay  dear  to  learn  this  important  lesson. 

But  leaving  these  days  of  small  beginnings,  which,  however,  are 
not  to  be  despised,  we  come  down,  or  rather  up,  to  our  wondrous 
and  grand  magnificent  achievements.  It  is  utterly  useless  to  attempt 
to  find  qualifying  words  to  suitably  express  the  status  of  railroad 
transportation  as  it  confronts  us  in  this  year  of  our  Lord  1893,  and 
as  we  see  it  in  epitome  in  yonder  building.  To  say  that  to-day  the 
safest  possible  way  of  locomotion  is  by  the  steam  railroad  car  is  but 
simply  stating  an  absolute  fact. 

Here  is  seen  the  crowning  triumph  of  inventive  talent,  mechan¬ 
ical  ability  and  skill  such  as  the  world  has  never  before  witnessed. 
A  passenger  train  of  cars  hurled  through  space  at  the  enormous 
velocity  of  65  to  70  miles  an  hour  with  as  much  and  more  safety  to 
each  of  its  200  to  500  passengers  as  if  riding  behind  his  own  old 
family  horse  drawing  the  stout  family  wagon,  is  the  marvel  of  this 
present  hour.  Somebody  somewhere  has  done  a  great  deal  of  hard 
thinking,  and  somebody  has  done  a  great  deal  of  honest  and  faithful 
experimenting  and  reduced  to  practical  application  the  results  of  this 
hard  thinking. 

All  of  us  who  take  part  here  can  well  remember  the  nervous 
fear  we  had  of  telescoping  when  riding  on  trains  prior  to  the  advent 


3 


of  the  Miller  hook  and  platform.  Some  of  us  may  carry  to  our 
graves  the  scars  received  from  the  jerks  and  shocks  common  to  all 
passenger  trains  coupled  with  the  old  style  link  and  pin  and  con¬ 
trolled,  or  attempted  control,  by  hand  brakes. 

In  the  blaze  and  glory  of  the  achievements  of  the  present  in 
railway  travel  it  is  difficult  for  us  to  realize  that  it  was  so  few  years 
back  the  public  was  so  well  pleased  with  the,  to  us  now,  unsafe  and 
rude  appliances  on  trains. 

The  advancement  in  safety  appliances  on  passenger  trains  is 
something  wonderful  for  the  rapid  succession  of  improvements.  To 
the  memory  of  those  who  have  participated  in  and  have  been  in  a 
sense  a  part  of  it,  it  is  nearly  like  that  which  presents  itself  to  the 
eye  in  the  Transportation  Building  on  the  grounds  in  the  park.  We 
are  looking  for  the  moment  on  the  crude,  the  rough,  the  now  would- 
be  uncomfortable,  the  slow  and  tedious,  and  in  many  respects  unsafe 
methods  of  travel  of  the  past.  We  turn  and  in  the  next  minute  we 
are  revelling  in  all  the  luxurious  belongings,  time,  distance,  and 
danger  annihilating  vestibule  palace  train  of  the  now,  and  standing 
at  its  head  this  marvel  of  our  century,  the  present  improved  locomo¬ 
tive  “999”  and  its  equal  fellows.  But  what  one  thing  of  all  that  so 
greatly  interests  every  spectator  in  these  magnificent  outfits  for  rapid 
and  safe  transit  above  all  others  gives  such  unparalleled  safety  to 
that  ponderous  engine  and  its  modern  parlors  and  sleeping  apart¬ 
ments  on  wheels? 

Next  in  importance  for  safety  to  the  flange  on  the  wheel  which 
holds  that  wheel  to  the  track  is  the  necessity  of  some  mighty  power 
to  grasp  that  wheel  in  a  vice-like  grip  to  stop  its  roll  when  its  con¬ 
tinued  motion  would  carry  the  train  to  danger. 

The  common  hand-brake  was  found  to  be  on  this  greatly  in¬ 
creased  weight  of  improved  engines  and  cars  utterly  incompetent  and 
unsafe.  Various  forms  of  power  brakes  were  brought  out  by  invent¬ 
ors,  chain,  buffer,  straight  air,  vacuum  and  other  forms  of  brakes 
were  tried,  and.  while  some  of  them  were  a  great  advance  over  the 
hand-brakes,  yet  the  great  want  was  not  met  until  the  advent  of  the 
Westinghouse  automatic  air-brake.  The  myriads  of  humanity  that 
now  travel  owe  a  debt  to  George  Westinghouse,  Jr.,  they  can  never 
pay.  It  matters  not  how  many  good  and  great  inventors  may 
travel  in  roads  now  made  plain,  to  George  Westinghouse  is  due 
the  power  of  going  ahead  and  blazing  the  trees  that  enables  lesser 
daring  ones  to  follow. 

It  is  not  the  design  of  this  paper  to  advertise  or  unduly  extol 
any  one  method  or  man;  simple  facts  and  strict  justice  are  the  ends 
sought.  The  speaker,  perhaps,  more  than  any  other  man  outside  of 
railroad  circles  and  the  inventors  and  makers  of  power  brakes  can 
speak  with  more  confident  intelligence  upon  this  point.  He  hopes 
to  be  able  to  do  this  without  offensive  egotism. 


4 


It  was  his  privilege  as  a  State  Railroad  Commissioner  of  Iowa 
to  be  honored  with  an  invitation  from  the  committee  of  experts  from 
the  Master  Car  Builders’  Association  to  participate  in  the  noted  brake 
tests  at  Burlington  on  the  C.,  B.  &  Q.  road  in  charge  of  this  com¬ 
mittee  in  1886  and  1887.  While  the  object  sought  in  these  tests 
was  to  find  some  practical  power  brake  suitable  for  freight  train  ser¬ 
vice,  the  want  of  which  was  beginning  to  be  felt  as  imperative  and 
which  will  be  discussed  further  on,  yet  as  a  result  of  those  remark¬ 
able  tests  under  the  faithful  and  most  conscientious  work  of  that 
committee  of  experts,  of  which  Mr.  G.  W.  Rhodes,  Master  of  Motive 
Power  of  the  Burlington  Railroad,  was  chairman,  we  have  now  the 
quick-acting  brake  brought  out  in  the  fall  of  1887  by  Mr.  Westing- 
house  which  gives  so  much  greater  safety  to  every  passenger  by  rail. 
As  already  intimated,  it  matters  not  how  many  firms  may  now  be 
making  a  quick-acting  brake,  the  name  of  George  Westingliouse 
should  and  will  be  handed  down  by  historians  of  railroad  safety 
appliances  as  the  one  man  whose  wonderful  inventive  ability  has 
done  more  to  make  travel  by  steam  railroad  so  almost  absolutely 
safe  than  any  other  man  in  the  world. 

Right  here  it  may  be  in  place  to  analyze  briefly  the  “why”  these 
amazingly  rapid  strides  in  all  that  not  only  pertains  to  safety  but 
comfort  of  travel  on  our  railroad  trains  and  also  to  ask  the  question, 
Is  there  need  of  any  compulsory  legislation  to  enhance  still  more  the 
safety  of  travel  on  passenger  trains?  I  am  very  frank  to  say  that  I 
have  always  felt  that  this  whole  matter  would  take  care  of  itself. 
There  never  has  been  and  in  my  judgment  there  never  will  be  any 
urgent  need  of  legislation  upon  this  particular  subject,  viz:  Safety  to 
passengers.  Why  ?  Simply  because  the  great  law  of  competition 
will  take  care  of  this  better  than  any  legislation,  state  or  national. 

Let  one  road  abolish  the  stove  as  a  means  of  heating  its  cars  and 
publish  that  fact,  its  competitor  and  parallel  neighbor  must  do  so  too 
or  see  its  customers  going  to  the  safer  heated  cars.  The  same  is  also 
true  of  lighting  methods.  Let  one  road  advertise  that  “its  cars  are 
lighted  with  Pintsch  gas  and  absolutely  safe,”  while  its  competitors 
use  other  and  less  safe  means,  and  the  fear  of  being  in  a  burning 
wreck  set  on  fire  by  unsafe  lamps  will  drive  passengers  to  the  cars 
with  the  safer  light.  There  never  has  been,  and  I  repeat,  there 
never  will  be,  in  my  judgment,  any  great  necessity  for  laws  requiring 
safety  appliances  on  passenger  cars  and  trains.  So  great  is  the  strife 
to  secure  passenger  traffic,  as  a  mere  advertising  method  it  is  cheaper 
by  all  odds  to  use  at  all  times  the  best  known  practical  safety  appli¬ 
ances.  And  with  what  a  miracle  of  superb  excellences  and  luxurious 
comfort  and  with  all  known  appliances  that  will  add  one  iota  of 
greater  safety  are  our  passenger  cars  now  perfected.  The  enterprise 
of  all  our  roads  of  any  considerable  importance  shown  in  this  direc¬ 
tion  is  worthy  of  all  praise.  No  general  manager  or  president  has 


5 


to  beg  long  for  necessary  funds  from  the  board  of  directors  for  this 
purpose. 

To-day  America  stands  far  ahead  of  all  the  rest  of  the  world  in 
her  appointments  for  comfortable,  luxurious,  rapid,  cheap  and  safe 
passenger  traffic;  and  competition  will  take  good  care  that  neither  of 
these  conditions  will  ever  be  lowered.  If  ever  the  aid  of  the  law¬ 
making  power  should  be  invoked  to  regulate  anything  in  regard  to 
passenger  traffic  we  need  not  be  surprised  to  see  it  used  to  restrict 
speed  and  competition.  We  may  yet  find  it  necessary  to  control 
competition  by  law  as  a  matter  of  safety  appliance  both  to  distant 
and  innocent  stockholders  of  railroad  property  and  also  as  a  means 
of  safety  to  the  travelling  public.  There  is  a  growing  mania  for  fast 
trains  as  an  advertising  scheme,  yet  who  of  the  wisest  in  railroad 
lore  is  yet  ready  to  say  where  the  limits  of  speed  and  the  greatest 
reasonable  safety  meet?  All  along  the  history  of  railroading  the 
impossible  of  to-day  has  been  the  practical  of  to-morrow. 

But  I  am  aware  that  I  was  honored  with  a  request  to  prepare  a 
paper  upon  safety  appliances  to  be  read  here  because  of  my  supposed 
interest  in  this  matter  as  connected  with  employes  in  the  freight  train 
service.  A  wide  field  opens  out  before  us  as  we  enter  upon  the  discus¬ 
sion  of  this  part  of  the  subject.  We  are  to  meet  with  facts  here  that 
should  be  dealt  with  frankly,  candidly  and  yet  in  plain,  unvarnished 
truth  and  justice.  It  is  reported  that  there  are  now  something  like 
800,000  to  1,000,000  men  and  women  employed  by  the  railways  of 
this  nation;  of  these  say  250,000  men  are  employed  in  train  and  yard 
service.  The  reports  of  the  state  railroad  commissioners,  in  states 
where  the  law  creates  such  officers,  and  the  reports  of  the  inter-state 
commerce  commission  show  that  out  of  this  250,000  not  less  than 
25,000  meet  with  casualties  yearly,  many  fatal,  more  making  them 
life  cripples  and  still  more  painful  injuries,  but  which  allow  of  partial 
recovery  so  that  the  victim  returns  again  to  work.  Neither  of  these 
sources  give  us  all  the  exact  facts.  Some  states  do  not  have  any  state 
railroad  commission  board  and  purely  state  roads  are  under  no  law  by 
which  they  are  required  to  report  to  the  inter-state  commerce  com¬ 
mission.  Hence  we  can  readily  see  that  we  do  not  get  from  these 
sources  reports  of  all  casualties  to  employes.  The  National  Associa¬ 
tion  of  Railway  Surgeons  at  their  annual  convention  last  year  at  Old 
Point  Comfort  in  Virginia  made  the  astounding  report  that  the  pre¬ 
ceding  year  furnished  over  31,000  subjects  for  their  investigation 
and  skillful  aid.  This  is  simply  horrible  and  challenges  credence. 
Over  one  in  every  eight  employed  in  handling  cars  and  trains  in  this 
country  must  be  either  killed  or  more  or  less  maimed  every  twelve 
months. 

As  a  rule  the  railway  surgeon  catches  all  who  are  badly  hurt, 
thousands  of  others  get  slight  injuries  who  never  come  to  the  sur¬ 
geon.  There  is  at  present  no  way  by  which  we  can  get  reports  that 


6 


will  give  all,  but  in  the  name  of  humanity  is  not  31,000  enough  for 
one  short  year?  Who  can  realize  all  that  that  means?  Something 
like  3,000  are  killed  outright.  These,  too,  are  all  strong,  able- 
bodied  men,  right  in  the  flush  of  manhood.  From  my  own  investi¬ 
gations,  which  need  not  here  be  detailed,  I  can,  with  great  confi¬ 
dence,  say  that  at  the  very  least  fully  50  per  cent,  of  this  large 
number  are  killed  or  injured  from  two  causes  alone,  viz.,  the  con¬ 
tinued  use  of  old  style  hand  couplers  and  the  hand  brake. 

Before  this  audience  I  need  not  dwell  on  the  terrible  facts  here 
brought  out;  I  will  merely  ask  you  to  estimate  for  yourselves  this: 
If  last  year  the  old  link  and  pin  draw-bar  and  the  hand  brake  called 
for  the  lives,  limbs  or  untold  sufferings  of  15,000  of  these  hardy  and 
faithful  railroad  employes,  how  many  lives,  how  many  limbs  and 
how  much  pain  and  anguish  have  been  offered  up  on  this  altar  of — 
what  shall  I  name  it? — since  the  first  freight  train  rolled  over  rails 
in  America?  None  of  us  can  answer  this.  Can  any  one  of  us  ans¬ 
wer  why  this  has  been  suffered  to  go  on  year  after  year  and  this  hor¬ 
rible  sacrifice  of  life  kept  up?  Why  has  the  crowning  achievement 
of  this  century,  “this  unparalled  perfection  of  railroad  transporta¬ 
tion' ’  been  bought  at  so  dear  a  price?  Why  has  it  been  allowed  that 
every  mile  of  rail  laid  in  America  has  been  bathed  in  the  blood  of 
the  faithful  employe? 

Now,  dare  1  trust  myself  to  go  on  and  in  this  presence  say  just 
how  this  matter  stands  in  my  mind,  and  I,  being  an  average  of  the 
common  layman,  show  how  it  appears  to  us,  the  common  people? 
WTill  my  motive  be  understood  and  appreciated?  My  only  desire  in 
presenting  this  paper  is  to  do  some  good,  to  help  on  and  accelerate  the 
grand  work  now  being  done  by  all  the  more  progressive  roads  in 
fitting  their  cars  with  automatic  couplers  and  power  brakes.  Please 
accept  what  I  say  in  the  spirit  in  which  I  give  it.  This  Congress  is 
an  epoch  in  the  railroad  history  of  America;  papers  read  here  are  not 
merely  for  to-day. 

The  terrible  record  confronts  us.  Somewhere  responsibility 
rests.  Are  these  employes  to  be  blamed  for  being  killed,  crippled  and 
injured?  If  not,  who  is?  Is  any  one?  None  of  us  are  willing  to  say  no 
to  this.  Corporate  bodies  scatter  and  so  thin  out  responsibility  that 
individual  responsibility  becomes  nearly  lost;  still  there  must  be  some¬ 
where  a  fault  and  responsibility.  AV ill  it  do  to  lay  it  to  a  lack  of 
inventive  and  mechanical  skill?  I  think  not.  These  have  been 
active  and  effective  to  make  passenger  travel  almost  marvelously 
safe.  Why?  Is  it  not  because  in  addition  to  competition  the  courts 
have  held  the  roads  responsible  for  the  safety  of  the  passengers? 
You  all  see  at  once  I  mean  a  great  deal  by  this.  Has  the  making  of 
one  ruling  for  the  passenger  and  another  for  the  employe  been  a 
safety  appliance  for  the  latter? 

I  am  not  here  to  give  a  tirade  against  the  courts.  I  honor 


7 


learning,  wisdom  and  ability,  but  will  it  be  out  of  place  for  me  to 
modestly  suggest  that  to-day,  under  the  greatly  changed  condition 
of  affairs,  brought  in  with  the  advent  of  the  locomotive,  that  the 
rulings  of  the  court,  founded  on  the  relations  of  master  to  servant, 
of  servant  to  fellow  servant  and  co-laborer,  200  years  ago  are  scarcely 
sufficient  to  meet  the  changed  conditions  of  to-day. 

Pardon  me  a  moment  while  I  attempt  to  analyze  for  illustration. 
Here  is  an  intended  passenger.  It  is  not  absolutely  necessary  that 
he  should  take  the  train.  He  knows  that  accidents  do  happen  to 
trains.  He  knows  that  the  dispatcher  in  yonder  office  may  make  a 
mistake  and  send  his  train  crashing  into  another.  He  knows  all 
this,  but  still  he  takes  the  train;  but  does  the  court  hold  him  as  con¬ 
tributing  to  the  results  of  the  collision  that  costs  him  his  life?  Does 
it  hold  that  he  assumed  the  risk  and  therefore  cannot  recover?  On 
the  other  hand  here  is  a  green,  simple  boy,  infatuated  with  a  desire 
to  be  a  trainman.  You  and  I  and  all  the  great  public  and  the  court 
judges  even  want  him,  green  as  he  is,  to  become  a  railroad  employe 
because  somebody  must  run  the  train.  We  want  to  ride,  we  want  to 
send  and  receive  our  goods.  It  is  absolutely  necessary  that  this 
boy,  unsophisticated  and  rustic  as  he  is,  having  hardly  the  slightest 
idea  of  what  railroading  is,  knowing  nothing  really  of  its  perils,  but 
desiring  to  follow  this  as  his  life  work,  and  in  so  doing  will  be  a 
great  benefit  tQ  us  all,  to  stockholders  and  to  all,  he  goes,  and  in  at¬ 
tempting  to  couple  the  first  car  perhaps  is  killed.  Parents  seek  to 
recover  something,  but  the  judge  whose  library  was  in  the  car  that 
killed  the  boy  decides  that  as  the  boy  was  supposed  to  know  all  the 
dangers  of  railroading  he  assumed  the  risks  and  by  trying  to  do  what 
we  all  wanted  him  to  do;  what  the  judge  wanted  him  to  do  so  he 
could  get  his  package  of  law  books;  doing  what  the  poor  boy  was  in 
a  sense  compelled  to  do  to  earn  his  bread;  doing  his  part  in  carrying 
on  that  which  is  now  become  a  necessity  of  our  civilization,  because 
he  did  this  he  contributed  by  his  own  negligence  to  his  death,  and 
therefore  the  parents  of  the  boy  cannot  recover. 

What,  we  common  people  ask,  are  our  laws  and  our  courts  for  ? 
Are  they  for  the  strong  or  for  the  weak  ?  But  let  me  be  fully  under¬ 
stood  here.  I  grant  I  am  in  earnest  and  using  plain  English.  Is  it 
that  I  would  mulct  the  roads  in  large  sums  to  enrich  the  employe  or 
his  family?  No!  no!  not  at  all  !  That  is  not  it  at  all.  I  am  a 
friend  to  the  railroads.  I  have  nothing  in  common  with  this  sense¬ 
less  howl  of  the  demagogues  against  corporations  and  roads.  While 
a  life-long  farmer  I  realize  that  the  prosperity  of  the  roads  is  the  re¬ 
sult  of  my  prosperity.  The  best  interest  of  the  roads  and  the  highest 
prosperity  of  the  communities  they  serve  are  one  and  the  same. 
There  is  a  community  of  interests  so  patent  that  the  “blind”  could 
see  it.  It  is  because  I  am  a  friend  to  the  roads  that  I  deal  in  plain 
words.  Let  the  courts  hold  the  roads  to  as  rigid  responsibility  for 


8 


the  life  of  the  employe  as  for  the  passenger  and  it  would  be  the  most 
effectual  safety  appliance  possible.  It  would  then  be  only  a  question 
of  short  time  when  every  car  would  be  equipped  with  automatic  coup¬ 
lers  and  every  train  with  power  brakes.  Then  this  dark,  foul  blot 
on  this  otherwise  grandest  achievement  of  this  nineteenth  century 
would  be  washed  away. 

Take  another  case.  The  company,  for  some  reason  good  to 
itself,  employs  a  dispatcher.  He  proves  incompetent,  he  gets  drunk, 
in  his  maudlin  stupidity  he  sends  two  trains  together  and  lives  of 
trainmen  are  sacrificed  and  others  are  crippled  for  life.  “Can  not 
recover  because  it  was  caused  by  negligence  of  a  co-employe.”  Did 
the  dead  men  have  any  voice  in  employing  the  incompetent  dis¬ 
patcher  ? 

In  the  same  collision  passengers  are  injured.  The  courts  allow 
them  heavy  damages,  but  the  faithful  engineer  who,  when  he  saw  the 
crash  inevitable,  still  stood  by  his  throttle  and  lever  in  faithful  and 
heroic  but  vain  attempts  because  of  lack  of  power  brakes  to  save  his 
train  and  dying  in  the  effort,  leaves  a  beggared  wife  who  cannot  re¬ 
cover,  so  says  the  court,  but  the  wife  of  the  passenger  killed  gets  ten 
thousand  dollars  at  the  hand  of  the  same  judge.  Such  rulings  as 
these  of  our  courts  are  not  safety  appliances  and  they  do  not  hasten 
to  put  proper  safety  appliances  on  our  freight  trains,  but  turn  our 
passenger  trains  into  museums  of  safety  appliances.  Hut  neither  the 
corporations  nor  the  courts  must  shoulder  all  the  responsibility,  and 
this  paper  would  fail  of  its  purpose  if  it  stopped  here. 

The  great  general  public  who  are  reaping  the  inestimable  ad¬ 
vantage  of  rail  transportation  have  not  only  stood  silently  by  “hold¬ 
ing  the  clothes”  of  those  most  active  in  the  immediate  responsibility, 
but  have  virtually  urged  on  this  inhuman  work.  How^  By  this  ex¬ 
treme  and  unreasoning  prejudice  against  railroads,  resulting  in  laws 
that  cripple  them  as  to  resources  so  that  it  becomes  extremely  diffi¬ 
cult  to  devise  ways  and  means  by  which  safety  appliances  can  be  se¬ 
cured  to  equip  the  freight  cars  of  this  nation  with  automatic  couplers 
and  power  brakes  which  will  cost  not  less  than  $75,000,000. 

The  public  should  cease  its  clamor  for  cheap  rates  until  the  roads 
had  first  made  railway  work  the  safest  possible  for  their  men.  Allow 
the  roads  to  charge  reasonable  rates  and  then  hold  them  to  a  strict 
responsibility  for  the  lives  and  persons  of  their  employes.  It  may 
be  asked  by  some  why  this  kind  of  talk  now  that  a  national  law  is  in 
power  requiring  safety  appliances  on  freight  cars.  Because  it  is  one 
thing  to  have  a  law  and  another  thing  to  have  a  public  sentiment  to 
back  up  and  execute  that  law.  But  this  paper  would  be  far  from 
accomplishing  its  purpose  if  it  did  not,  to  the  best  of  its  ability,  at¬ 
tempt  to  give  praise  to  whom  vast  amount  of  praise  is  due.  The 
world  will  never  know  how  much  we  are  indebted  for  the  wonderful 
immunity  we  have  from  accidents  in  railway  travel  and  traffic  to  the 


9 


untiring  and  most  intelligent  and  faithful  work  of  the  technical  de¬ 
partments  of  our  railroad  companies. 

It  has  been  the  speaker’s  high  privilege  for  the  last  five  or  six 
years  to  be  allowed  to  meet  many  of  these  officials  in  their  National 
Convention,  more  especially  with  what  are  known  as  the  National 
Master  Car  Builders’  and  Master  Mechanics’  Association.  These  As¬ 
sociations  represent  from  90  to  95  per  cent,  of  all  ears  of  the  conti¬ 
nent.  The  members  of  these  Associations  are  men  of  thoroughly 
trained  minds  and  of  great  practical  knowledge.  At  the  annual 
conventions  of  these  Associations  members  come  from  nearly  every 
road  in  the  states  and  Canada.  At  these  conventions  everything  that 
goes  to  the  make  up  of  the  best  possible  locomotive,  passenger  and 
freight  car  is  discussed  from  a  practical  standpoint. 

It  is  with  these  men  where  the  ground  work  foundation  of  the 
wonderful  safety  for  railroad  travel  is  laid.  Aside  from  the  annual 
meetings  each  considerable  locality  has  its  local  club  of  these  men 
where  they  meet  either  once  a  month  or  once  in  two  weeks  when 
able  papers  are  read  and  discussed  relative  to  all  these  matters  of 
car  building  and  the  greatest  possible  safety  combined  with  consistent 
economy.  These  men  blow  no  trumpets,  they  do  no  posing  before 
the  public,  but  quietly  in  the  great  railroad  shops  and  in  the  labora¬ 
tories  of  the  great  railroad  systems  they  are  working  out  the  problems 
of  economical  and  safe  railroad  transportation. 

These  men  have  evolved  uniform  standards  for  almost  every 
thing  that  enters  into  the  make  up  of  cars.  Probably  no  one  thing 
in  all  these  investigations,  tests,  and  experiments  has  received  such 
close,  faithful  and  impartial  study  and  long  earnest  interchange  of 
views  as  this  of  a  uniform  safe  coupler  and  a  power  brake  for  freight 
cars. 

After  years  of  patient  work  the  committee  on  automatic  couplers 
made  their  final  report  to  the  National  Convention  held  in  Minneap¬ 
olis  in  June,  1887.  The  committee  reported  in  favor  of  the  Janney 
vertical  plane  hook  type  as  a  standard  form  of  coupler,  and  the  con¬ 
vention,  by  a  two-thirds  vote,  adopted  this  report  which  was  after¬ 
wards  confirmed  by  a  letter  ballot  of  over  a  two-thirds  vote  of  all 
the  roads  represented  in  that  association,  which  was  not  less  than  90 
per  cent,  of  all  the  roads  in  the  nation.  This  form  of  a  car  coupler 
or  draw-bar  has  grown  more  and  more  in  favor  with  the  roads  until 
now  the  Great  American  Railway  Association,  including  in  its  mem¬ 
bership  about  75  per  cent,  of  all  miles  of  railroad  of  the  nation,  are 
£  practically  a  unite  in  favor  of  this  form  of  draw-bar  as  the  standard 

automatic  coupler  for  all  the  freight  cars  of  America. 

One  of  the  defects  of  the  recent  Congressional  legislation  upon 
i  this  subject  of  safety  appliances  is,  that  it  does  not  recognize  and 
legalize  this  meritorious  work  of  these  eminently  practical  mechanics, 
the  Master  Car  Builders,  in  so  many  words.  But  so  many  of  the 


10 


leading  roads  having  adopted  this  form  of  coupler  as  “standard,” 
the  strong,  though  unwritten  law  of  interchange  among  railways, 
will  have  the  same  result  as  though  legalized  by  Congress. 

It  is  intensely  gratifying  to  note  the  grand  work  now  being  done 
by  the  leading  roads  in  equipping  their  cars  with  the  M.  C.  B.  type 
of  safety  couplers.  It  is  unfortunate  that  there  are  so  many  varieties 
of  this  type  being  put  on  to  cars.  If  our  coupler  makers  could  only 
pool  their  issues  and  have  but  absolutely  one  make  of  this  type,  as 
was  nearly  the  case  for  years  with  the  Miller  hook  and  platform  on 
passenger  cars,  so  that  every  car  would  be  fitted  up  with  this  one 
make  and  the  unlocking  device  the  same  on  every  car,  it  would  then 
seem  that  car  coupling  work  would  be  rendered  as  safe  as  we  could 
reasonably  ask  for  it  to  be.  Would  it  not  be  wise  to  seek  to  amend 
the  present  law  to  this  effect? 

Indeed,  it  might  well  be  remarked  here  that,  had  all  the  roads 
evinced  such  enterprise  in  this  matter  of  safety  couplers  and  brakes 
as  certain  progressive  roads  that  could  be  mentioned,  there  would 
have  been  no  need  of  the  law.  The  law  was  and  is  a  necessity  to 
spur  on  the  laggard  roads. 

Fearful  and  dangerous  as  the  work  of  car  coupling  is,  and 
almost  incredible  the  long  lists  of  fatalities  and  injuries  arising  there¬ 
from,  still  the  actual  fatalities  are  greater  in  number  from  the  con¬ 
tinued  use  of  the  old  hand  brake  on  freight  cars  than  from  any  other 
one  cause. 

When  one  comes  to  really  get  right  down  to  a  contemplation  of 
the  actual  facts  of  the  exposure  and  risk  incurred  by  a  freight  brake- 
man,  no  man  who  has  left  in  him  one  spark  of  real  humane  manhood 
can  for  a  moment  be  reconciled  to  the  conditions  that  confronts  him. 
The  future  historian  of  railroading  in  America  will  find  it  hard  to 
make  posterity  believe  that  human  beings  were  required  to  ride  decks 
of  our  freight  cars  facing  the  bitter  blasts  of  winter,  with  mercury 
down  to  20  to  30  below  zero,  compelled  to  run  from  top  of  one  car 
to  another;  the  black  smoke  and  steam  from  the  engine  blinding  him 
as  it  rolls  back  over  the  train  in  dense  volumes  so  that  he  cannot  see 
the  deadly  chasm  between  the  ends  of  the  rolling,  swinging,  jerking 
cars,  covered  with  sleet  and  snow,  and  rushing  against  a  winter  gale 
of  30  miles  an  hour  at  the  rate  of  25  miles;  made,  I  say,  to  ride 
those  cars  under  such  conditions,  which  are  every  day  occurrences  in 
our  winter  months,  and  what  for?  Why  to  interpose  his  puny 
strength  between  that  ponderous  train  and  its  momentum  and  a 
danger  ahead  sure  to  be  met  unless  he  can  by  the  old  brake  stop  the 
train,  which  on  such  a  night  and  down  that  grade  is  about  like  the 
fabulous  fly  upon  the  bull’s  horn. 

How,  is  there  a  man  of  us  here  to-day  who  would  do  the  work 
of  a  freight. brakeman  one  winter's  night  for  all  the  railroads  on  the 
continent?  Ho,  not  one.  Still  tens  of  thousands  of  our  fellow  men, 


11 


bone  of  our  bone,  fiesli  of  our  flesh,  are  doing  just  this  kind  of  work, 
year  in  and  year  out,  right  here  in  Christian  America.  And  when 
in  one  of  these  black,  cold,  stormy  nights,  with  the  wind  howling  a 
hurricane,  decks  covered  with  ice,  his  glimmer  of  a  lantern  blown 
out,  yet  true  to  his  trust  pushing  on  to  reach  the  brakes,  he  slips  and 
drops  between  the  cars  and  is  ground  into  an  unrecognizable  mass 
under  cold,  cruel  iron,  and  his  mother,  when  seeking  some  recom¬ 
pense  for  the  idol  of  her  heart  and  her  only  support,  is  told  by  him 
who  is  appointed  to  hold  the  scales  of  exact  justice,  4 ‘You  can’t  re¬ 
cover.  Your  son  assumed  all  the  hazards  of  the  work.” 

It  does  seem  to  a  common  man  that  such  ruling  is  not  a  safety 
appliance,  when  at  the  same  time  it  is  a  matter  of  common  intelligence 
that  down  that  same  grade  on  just  such  a  night  a  train  of  50  cars 
can  be  hurled  at  the  rate  of  40  miles  an  hour  and  in  case  of  necessity 
can  be  brought  to  a  standstill  by  the  modern,  quick-acting  power 
brake  inside  of  500  feet  and  not  a  train-man  need  to  leave  the  caboose, 
all  being  done  by  a  simple  turn  of  the  wrist  of  the  engineer  in  his 
cab.  Under  just  such  conditions  as  described,  thousands  of  our 
strong  young  men  have  met  their  most  tragic  death  and  still  the 
work  goes  on,  but  now,  thank  God,  in  a  decreasing  rate. 

It  may  very  pertinently  be  asked  why,  if  power  brakes  are  prac¬ 
tical  for  freight  cars,  do  not  managers  put  them  on?  Managers  do 
not  always  have  the  say  about  such  things.  Brakes  and  couplers 
cost  money.  Money  of  ^railroad  company  cannot  be  used  in  large 
quantities  for  such  purposes  only  as  appropriated  by  vote  of  directors 
any  more  than  public  funds  can  be  used  to  build  post  offices  only  as 
appropriated  by  Congress.  These  Boards  of  Directors  have  stock¬ 
holders  behind  them;  of  these  many  of  them  are  absentees  and  they, 
not  fully  understanding  the  necessity,  will  not  readily  listen  to  calls 
for  money  for  improvements. 

While  the  operating  departments  now  recognize  the  fact  that 
power  brakes  and  automatic  couplers  are  not  only  good  and  neces¬ 
sary  for  safety  to  trainmen,  but  are  actually  economic  appliances; 
while  they  know  that  when  12  to  20  per  cent,  of  the  cars  of  a  train, 
fitted  up  with  train  brakes  and  so  located  as  to  be  used,  enables  the 
engineer  to  make  much  better  time  and  gives  him  a  more  complete 
control  of  his  train  than  the  assistance  of  any  three  brakemen  could 
possibly  give;  yet  these  men  are  powerless  unless  the  money  is  regu¬ 
larly  appropriated  for  this  purpose.  The  object  of  the  present  na¬ 
tional  law  is  to  re-inforce  managers  and  other  officials  when  they  ask 
for  means  to  put  on  these  safety  appliances.  Now  they  say,  “Thus 
saith  the  law,”  and  the  money  must  come. 

In  the  face  of  facts  now  so  patent  it  does  seem  that  the  rulings 
of  the  courts  should  be  more  or  less  moulded  to  meet  the  present 
conditions. 

Automatic  standard  couplers  have  been  adopted  by  the  railroads 


12 


themselves  on  their  own  motion  by  practically  a  unanimous  letter 
ballot  vote  after  90  days’  consideration  upon  the  action  of  their  own 
officials,  viz.,  The  Master  Car  Builders.  The  standard  height  of 
draw-bars  has  also  been  in  the  same  way  established.  It  is 
also  now  established  as  a  conceded  fact  that  the  air-brake  is  prac¬ 
tically  applicable  to  freight  train  services,  whereby  the  engineer  has 
far  better  control  of  his  train  than  can  be  given  him  by  half  a  dozen 
brakemen,  hence  relieving  the  latter  of  the  great  risk  and  exposure 
formerly  met. 

Aside  from  these  safety  appliances  there  are  others  that  could 
be  profitably  mentioned,  but  I  have  already  exceeded  my  time  and 
exhausted  your  patience. 

The  cultivating  of  good  will  between  officials  and  men.  This 
attempt  at  profit  sharing,  so  commendably  undertaken  by  the  Illi¬ 
nois  Central  company,  and  above  all,  this  wonderful  movement 
among  the  men  themselves  in  the  interest  of  total  abstinence  from 
all  that  intoxicates,  whether  when  on  duty  or  off,  as  witnessed  by 
the  remarkable  fact  that  in  one  short  year  from  its  inception  nearly 
100,000  practical  railway  men  have  put  on  the  white  R.  R.  T.  A. 
button  of  total  abstinence  from  all  that  befuddles  the  brain,  is  one 
of  the  greatest  movements  on  the  road  of  safety  appliances  ever 
undertaken  by  railroad  men,  and  when  we  can  see  all  the  officials 
also  wearing  this  white  button  in  good  faith  for  the  encouragement 
and  help  of  the  men,  we  may  then  say  th®  day  is  dawning  when  the 
record  of  railroad  accidents  shall  be  few  and  far  between. 

One  word  more  and  I  am  done.  Overtime,  not  allowed  proper 
time  for  rest,  is  certainally  not  a  safety  appliance.  Crank  as  I  may 
be  called  because  of  my  views  and  words  on  safety  appliances,  yet  I 
will  venture  the  assertion  that  when  men  have  regular  hours  of  rest, 
have  tlieir  one  day  rest  in  seven,  we  shall  find  that  they  rise  up  from 
mere  machine-like  things  with  a  “don’t-care-a-damn”  way  of  doing 
things  to  that  of  thinking,  reasonable  men  with  an  interest  in  their 
work  and  regard  for  the  rights  of  property.  Sunday  rest  as  far  as 
possibly  practical  in  the  exigences  of  the  movement  of  the  commerce 
of  a  great  nation,  will,  in  my  judgment,  be  a  very  important  factor 
in  safety  appliances.  L.  S.  COFFIN, 

Fort  Dodge,  Iowa.  Ex-Railroad  Commissioner. 


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